How many times have you found yourself wishing you had just opened your mouth and said what you really wanted to? For most of us there have been hundreds of times throughout our lives where we wished that we had spoken our minds and stood up to someone who was basically just a bully. Maybe you didn’t have the confidence to ask for something that you deserved, like a promotion or a raise. Yes, we’ve all been there at one time so no big deal. Right? Wrong! I know how important it can be to speak up and just say it because believe it or not, if you don’t- your life can take a whole other path. I am not talking about communicating where you have to divulge your most inner feelings and secrets. I am referring to those two or three little words when it matters most. As I look back at my life, I realize that not saying what I wanted to say exactly when I wanted to, literally changed my life. Miscommunication can absolutely destroy lives, love’s, happiness, friendships and trust. It can create so much hurt, disappointment, anger, confusion, jealousy, loneliness. It sounds odd to think that just 2 or 3 words can actually affect the rest of your life. If you don’t speak up and say to those who mean the most to you something as simple as ‘Don’t go’ or ‘please stay’, how will they ever know that is what you really want? What keeps us from just opening our mouths and saying what can actually be the most important thing to someone? Fear. Fear of the unknown. Maybe we don’t say it because we are afraid of just standing up for ourselves and afraid to be our true selves. No matter what the reason is, the next time you are in a situation where you have the opportunity to Just say it, to just say how you feel to those who mean the most to you, Just Say It! You’ve got nothing whatsoever to lose. But, if you don’t say it, you have everything to lose.; like (the ones you love more than they will ever know because you didn’t tell them when you had the chance)
Category: FAMILY
‘FAMILY’ TRADITIONS
A Tradition is ‘an inherited or customary pattern of behaviors or actions’. So I guess that means that something as simple as those Sunday drives we took would be considered a tradition. Every year as soon as the weather was nice enough, dad would take the top off of the Jeep Scout and on Sundays we would all load up for a leisure drive up and around the mountain. My mother thought of it as a way for the family to spend time together, but I know that it was dad’s way of getting to scope out where the deer might be hanging out. Those Sunday drives were not my favorite thing to do because it entailed sitting for long periods of time, which I was definitely not good at. Whenever I would start getting antsy dad would announce “the first one to spot a buck gets a dollar”. This would take my mind off of having to sit still for so long. My mother always complained that the roads were too bumpy or that the wind was messing up her hairdo, and my older sister just complained, because that was what she did all the time. Sometimes we got to go over the hill in the other direction to Booneville, where my mother’s aunt and uncle lived. Their son J was super tall and strong just like my Uncle Keith and I guess beings I happened to be extremely tiny for my age, they both were my personal monkey bars. They would stand close enough to the wall so they could have their arm straight and stiff with their hand flat against the wall. Then I would do like a pull up on their arm and flip myself up and over, landing on the other side. Sometimes I would just hang by my knees before flipping off, and all the while they would be acting like I wasn’t even there, just carrying on their conversation with everyone. Their house was huge and so was the property it sat on.There was always candy in the fancy little bowls on the coffee tables and a built in swimming pool that I loved swimming in even though it always seemed to be windy and colder up there then at my house. When J was in college he would come to our house every week for dinner and it became a tradition for me to spill my full glass of milk on him because it happened every single time without fail. When it came to Holiday Traditions, there was never a Christmas that did not entail getting to wear my best dress to the movie theater where all of us Masonite Kids got to sit on Santa’s lap, sing Songs with the Elves and watch a Disney movie all while our parents were having the traditional Christmas Gala dinner. On Christmas Morning, waking up at 5am was definitely a tradition that my parents could have done without. For my 13th birthday my Dad took me to The Palace Restaurant. After that it became a tradition for us to have lunch together on my birthday every year. I remember one time when we went to an all u can eat Chinese food buffet. We sat there talking and I just kept eating and eating and talking for the longest time. The man working there came over and said ‘will you be staying for dinner as well’? We didn’t understand what he really meant until we saw that it really was almost time for dinner! Dad and I laughed all the way home about it. Another true tradition was the Opening Day of Deer Season. I would wake to the sound of boots clomping , men laughing and the smell of coffee brewing. I can still see myself wearing one of Dad’s white t-shirts for a nightgown (they were as long on me as my nightgowns were but way more comfy)as I stood on the kitchen chair pouring the coffee in to his thermos. I got to go with them all once but Dad said “never again”. He said I never stopped talking long enough for them to even see a deer that day. *Dad nicknamed me Motormouth as soon as I could talk.
My most favorite of traditions are the ones my girls and I had. Like taking turns getting to be the one to put the angel on the tree. For Christmas Eve they opened one gift, which was usually cozy pajamas to wear for the following mornings festivities and photos. Every Christmas morning I would make hot cocoa w/marshmallows and blueberry muffins for everyone to have while we opened presents. When the girls were babies I began baking their birthday cakes which was usually a pink cake topped with my homemade pink frosting and I guess that became a tradition because when they were older and given the choice , they still wanted me to make their cakes instead of buy them, which thrilled me of course because I loved doing it!!. For our birthdays we always got to choose our favorite meal to have for the ‘family dinner’ that took place on the birth day. then the following weekend was their party. One of my most favorite traditions was anytime my girls went somewhere like to an amusement park, or on a class trip, if I couldn’t go they would bring home a souvenir for me. Many times, the keepsakes were Precious Moments figurines. But, no matter what, everything on my ‘mommy shelf’ will always be precious to me. Family Tradition means doing something the same way , during the same occasion, with the people you care about, that creates a desire to continue it; and when it’s gone the memories of those times help fill the hole in you from the emptiness just a little. Simply said, Family Traditions should be cherished.
Write about a few of your favorite family traditions.
Beginning Jan. 2022 non-citizens/immigrants entering the U.S. by way of land borders will need to be vaccinated.
Biden says this is one of the many ways he is taking steps to keep US safe! I was actually appalled at the idea of American’s being forced to do something that immigrants have not even been asked to do. This is just another example of the preferential treatment given to anyone who isn’t a U.S. Citizen.For about a month now I have been shopping for a used vehicle. I met with about 20 different people who were here on temporary work visa’s and needed to sell their cars because they were leaving the country to go home earlier than expected. One group of guys were returning to Greece, one couple was going to Chili, another to Argentina and two were returning to the Caribbean (I wanted to go with them). One lady, who was returning home to South Africa said that her return had been delayed due to flights getting cancelled. She said that after seeing on our media what was happening in her country she was really scared and booked a flight to an alternative country as well. However, once she had spoken to family members and learned that what was being reported on the news media here was false information, that everything in South Africa was fine, she was anxious to get back. Why were they all in such a hurry to leave here? Because they do not want to have to get vaccinated. They do not feel it is safe. And contrary to what is being told by the media, all other countries are not forcing their people to get the injection. I am curious though, if Biden’s requirement about border crossers begins in January what does he/They plan to do about the millions who have already entered illegally in the past year or two, during the time when he claimed the borders were closed? It is quite odd that nowadays in order to have a job We have to be drug tested, and background checked, and be vaccinated and wear masks- but none of these things are imposed on families with multi-generations of those who refuse to get a job simply because they don’t want to. Thank you for reading! signed JustMe! I would just like to say to those of you who love to stir things up just to take the focus away from things you do not understand, I have just one rule for comments IF YOU AIN’T GOT NOTHIN’ NICE TO SAY….DON’T SAY NOTHING AT ALL!!
GENETICALLY MODIFIED MOSQUITOS RELEASED IN THE FLORIDA KEYS.
That is the heading for numerous news articles back in May of 2021. These labs created mosquitos are designed to reduce the number of female offspring because only the females bite and can transmit disease. The males were designed with a gene that he will pass through during mating. The gene somehow does not harm his mate nor any males during reproduction but is ‘supposed to kill any female offspring, thus reducing the number of biting mosquitos. They refer to the gene he was made with as a ‘death mechanism’ and more than 100,000 of these Genetically Modified creatures were let go for the mere purpose of an experiment. This experiment was the best idea that government officials and scientists could come up with to fight the war on mosquitos now that pesticides no longer seem to work. Wow! Maybe my brain does not work the way everyone else’s does, and I am certainly not a genius, but wouldn’t bringing in a bunch of guineas and chickens been the obvious thing to do. They love (real) mosquitos! No potential or unknown risks would come of it, and on top of taking care of the mosquito problem, there would be eggs to eat, and their poop is a fantastic fertilizer for your gardens and pastures. Maybe my thinking is too simple for y’all, but that’s how it’s done in the country. I wonder what type of future issues will come from the frogs, lizards and birds that eat those death gene carrying mosquitos? And what will happen if we eat a chicken or fish that has feasted on the lab insects.? The saddest part of all this is that more than 300,000 residents tried to fight this experiment from being released into the environment, but the CDC, EPA, FDA, and other government offices and agencies still approved it. Keep in mind that they are the same one’s that also approved all of the toxic and harmful products like Roundup, that they claimed was safe for the environment and humans.
Creating insects and animals in a laboratory is just creepy.
HomeMade-HickChick 